NEW YORK, June 23, 1992 -- Sharp Electronics Corporation has begun shipping
the PC-6881, a highly-integrated color notebook computer designed to offer
mobile professionals the most usability in a notebook computer format. The
suggested retail price is $4,799.

Featuring an 8.4-inch active matrix TFT (thin film transistor) color VGA
display and a 25 MHz Intel386 SL processor, the PC-6881 brings hardware
and software technologies together that have never before been
incorporated into a notebook computer. The unit offers a high-speed LCD
screen, a built-in micro trackball located above the keyboard, an IC card
slot, an 80 MB hard disk and a sophisticated power management system.

To ease the transition from desktop to notebook, the PC-6881 offers a
full-size 79-key keyboard. Rather than offering a detachable pointing
device as an accessory, Sharp has integrated a Microsoft-compatible micro
trackball directly into the computer chassis above the keyboard. The
built-in micro trackball offers the convenience of trackball control
without the burden of an extra piece to carry.

"A mouse or other external pointing device in use can take up almost as
much space as the notebook computer itself," notes Paul Crane, vice
president, Copier and Imaging Systems Division. 'With an integrated micro
trackball, notebook PC users can comfortably point and click on an
airplane fold-out tray, their lap or other small space without carrying
along separate peripherals."

The unit also supports an external mouse, trackball or other pointing
device through the RS-232C serial port. Additional standard interfaces
include an expansion bus, a parallel/external 5.25-inch floppy drive,
numeric keypad and external CRT monitor port.

The integrated trackball, in conjunction with the high-speed triple
supertwist paper-white VGA display, enables users to quickly move the
cursor without temporarily losing it on the screen, even in Windows
applications.

The color screen requires one-third less power and is half the thickness of
previous Sharp active matrix displays. Under VGA emulation, 256 colors can
be displayed simultaneously from a palette of 256,000.

In addition to 80 megabytes of hard disk storage, the unit offers two
megabytes of RAM and a 3.5-inch 1.44 MB floppy disk drive, allowing the
most advanced software programs to be loaded and fully-functional under
Windows or DOS 5.0.

An IC card slot, conforming to the PC Memory Card International Association
(PCMCIA) version 2.0 specification, is integrated into the unit. The
versatile IC card slot enables users to easily increase system memory via
RAM or ROM cards, load software programs and attach input/output devices
such as modems, fax/modems and LAN adapters by simply sliding in a card.

Users can also increase system memory up to 8 MB by adding 2 and 4 MB RAM
boards in an easily-accessible expansion compartment beneath the unit
which also accepts a math coprocessor.

For presentation graphics applications, the PC includes a connector for an
external VGA monitor at resolutions up to 800 g 600. The system's BIOS is
stored in Flash ROM, allowing users to upgrade to future versions of
system, screen and power management BIOS by installing the new software
through the floppy disk drive.

Sophisticated Power Management 

Working closely with Phoenix Technologies and Intel Corporation, Sharp has
incorporated advanced power management BIOS and utility software that
takes advantage of the low power requirements of the Intel386 SL processor
through several features.

The four-level power management system includes a local standby mode for
device control, global standby for CPU and system control, and two
separate suspend modes.

With the push of a button, or automatically when the cover is closed, the
Suspend/Resume feature shuts the computer down completely except for a
tiny current to keep the memory alive. This extremely low-power mode saves
the battery and offers users the convenience of being able to instantly
suspend applications, even under Windows, and later resume operation at
exactly the screen where they left without having to reboot.

A Suspend to Disk feature automatically saves all data from any application
running when the power is turned off saving it to a section of the hard
disk. In addition, power management utilities accessible through DOS and
Windows allow power management settings to be adjusted to optimize battery
usage.

Powerful Options 

Options include a 2400 baud modem PC card, 2 or 4 MB RAM card, expansion
unit, internal battery pack, external battery and numerical keypad. The
Sharp expansion unit accepts boards and input/output devices such as tape
drives and additional disk drives. Ethernet LAN IC cards, 2400 baud
fax/modems, solid state disks and a variety of PCMCIA 2.0-compatible RAM
and ROM cards are under development and will be available soon from
independent software vendors.

The PC-6881 weighs 5.7 lbs and measures 8.5" (D) x 11.0" (W) x 1.9" (H).
For more information, contact the Imaging Systems Group, Sharp Electronics
Corporation, Sharp Plaza, Mahwah, NJ 07430 or call 201-529-9600.

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